because everyone is in the country, because it is considered ‘safer’ here, there is no room to move. We went to the pool this morning – me and a granddaughter – no room to swim. we want to meet some friends in the afternoon – but we have to be very careful about the hours because of the traffic. The streets around us are all dug up in anticipation of the improved public transportation system, so the local cars are all lined up on our street trying to get out.

We couldn’t go to the park as a family because the puppy is still not totally vaccinated and not even leashed-trained, and the park had other families entertaining their dogs.

But of course, I exaggerate our complaints. We’re not in Tokyo, we don’t have tickets to Tokyo, and we personally don’t have any variants at the moment. Despite the dilapidated appearance of our building, it hasn’t fallen down, or been blown up. We haven’t contributed to the automobile pollution because we barely use our only car, and we Will find some way to help people in Lebanon.

And of course, since our news programs aren’t saying anything about all the crises in the world and here, we’re pretending things are fine – just fine.